News

China Steps up Monitoring of Farm Products

20 April 2015

CHINA - Monitoring of farm and aquaculture products in China by the Ministry of Agriculture for quality and safety has found that the majority are safe and the levels of contamination have remained stable.

The Ministry of Agriculture carried out routine tests on vegetable, livestock and poultry products and aquatic products in 152 large and medium sized cities in 31 provinces.

The tests in the first three months of the year looked at 78 product lines and altogether 10,292 samples were taken.

In total 95.8 per cent of the products tested were passed fit for consumption with meat and poultry products showing that 99.4 per cent passed.

For vegetables 94.3 per cent passed and 95.9 per cent of aquatic products were given the all clear.

The ministry of agriculture said that the data showed that the quality and safety of agri products was stable.

However, in those areas where the products did not pass the tests the ministry has notified the food safety authorities in the region and strengthened the supervision of the handling of the products.

The ministry said that there were several areas of concern for those products that did not pass the tests and that needed rectifying, including action on the types of pesticides used and the use of pesticides, meat that had gone off, the quality of fresh and raw milk, the use of antimicrobials in livestock farming, pig slaughter procedures, areas in aquaculture production and the use of counterfeit agricultural products.